


A Mother's Love

by afinecollector (orphan_account)



Series: Not Waving but Drowning [17]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Family, Gen, JME, Janz Syndrome, Mother and Son, Post-Stroke, Rehabilitation, Seizure, Speech impediment, a mother's love, speech therapy, stroke
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-03
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-09-14 14:39:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9186638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/afinecollector
Summary: Violet's far-reaching anger at Sherlock's lifestyle surfaces, but her love conquers all.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A small additional snapshot into Sherlock's post-stroke care.

The sun that broke through the large window on the fourth floor of the hospital was brilliant, illuminating the two-bed bay with a glow that Violet would call heavenly. It was warm in its path, and the small breeze of cool summer air that came through the opening of the outward-opened window smelled of beach holidays and sun screen. She sat on the foot of Sherlock’s bed, one leg drawn up and tucked beneath her whilst she balanced herself with the other, her toes just touching the high-gloss linoleum floor beneath her shoe. She took a steady breath and leaned forward to place the card in her hand down onto the table, and retrieved another from the pile that were all face-down. She glanced at it, then showed it to her son. 

She made a popping sound with her lips as she flattened them to make a “B” sound. “Buh-buh…” She sounded. “Ball, Sherlock… come on, control mouth. Ball. Buh-all…” She put emphasis on the “L” sounds, knowing it was the tongue control to form sounds like L, T, S, G, C, D and J that he was struggling with. 

So much had returned, remarkably quickly, in the three weeks following the stroke Sherlock had suffered and Violet had found herself lulled into a false sense of calm that all would be okay. But Sherlock’s speech, though understandable, lacked the control it once had and he lisped and slushed his way through even the simplest of sounds. ‘Fit’ became ‘fith’, ‘Sherlock’ became ‘Thurlock’, and ‘seizure’ was nigh on impossible for the boy’s mouth to handle at all. 

“Bawn,” Sherlock repeated, and while he had repeated the word and has known what he was saying, his tongue failed to fully cooperate and his L’s were replaced with a smudging of palatal letter-sounds instead. He stared back at her, sitting in a stance that mirrored his mother’s, with an expression that was less than impressed. 

His curls were mussed, his face unshaven, and eyes were tired. He looked sicker than he felt, he sounded sicker than he looked, and all in all he was lucky he wasn’t left with something more serious than a slight speech impediment. He could have had more serious lasting damage, more extensive effects. He’d escaped sided weakness, somehow had cheated death, and had emerged with a lisp and - oddly - decreased seizures. 

Violet placed the card down, nodding her head. At this point, she’d take his communication - imperfect though it was - over the thought that her son could have died. “One more,” She said, fishing through the pile blindly for her next card. She peeked at it, then flashed it at him. “Family.” 

“Faminy.” Sherlock said, blue eyes flashing at her. “...’top now,” He leaned back against the pillows stacked behind him and drew up the leg he had balancing down on the floor. “I’ve had ‘nough.” 

Violet relented, and got to her feet. She gathered the cards up together and noisily banged them against the table until she had them in a perfectly aligned deck. Sherlock frowned at her and, feeling his eyes on her, she turned to him. “Oh, what?” She said jovially. “You think you’re the only one allowed to make noise in this family? Dad and I can be just as noisy too, you know? Where do you think you inherited it from?” 

Sherlock rolled his eyes and smiled before giving a bark of a chesty cough. It seemed his stint in hospital, and away from the cigarettes he adored, had seen his lungs begin to clear themselves of tar and dirt, resulting in the young man coughing productively for over a week. 

“Is Dad coming?” He asked her, breathing deeply, the hard C of coming forming into more of soft T. 

Violet nodded as she pushed the cards into their cardboard box, and left them neatly on the repositionable table. “He will; he’s meeting Mikey somewhere and he’s going to drive here afterwards. We all wanted to be involved in the speech therapy today.” Sherlock crinkled his nose at her words. “Don’t look at me like that, young man. You’ll be coming home soon; I need to know what I can do to make sure that very small weakness in your little mouth doesn’t hang around any longer than it has to. Besides that, I wanted to talk to your neurologist and the nurse said he would be here this afternoon. I wanted to know what anticonvulsants you’ll be on when you go home.” 

“Same ones,” Sherlock supposed, lisping heavily. 

“Hopefully,” Violet nodded her head, and walked closer to where he son was sitting at the top of the bed. She cupped his cheeks and held him there, before moving closely enough to kiss the tip of his nose. “They work well, I’d hate for them to change them. I like this you; barely any daydreams, jerks isolated to waking up in the morning and not one big one…” She smiled, too close for Sherlock to focus on her, and then released him again. 

As she walked away, Sherlock could tell she was upset. She’d been upset a lot and he’d been able to read it easily. She turned away from him, made gestures like she was about to tie up her hair and then would release it again in favour of massaging her own neck with both hands. He worked his teeth against the inside of his bottom lip, trying to work out if he should try to comfort her or not. “I’m okay,” he said, eventually, and he sounded more confident than he felt. He hoped it had worked, and was relieved when she turned back to him and smiled - albeit with watery eyes. 

“I know you are, love.” She said with a gentle nod. 

“I’m sorry.” 

Violet stiffened her lower jaw and brushed her fringe from her forehead with her left hand. “I know, son.” 

“You don’t.” Sherlock shook his head. He paused, only to cough, then shook his head again. “And it wasn’t Victor’s fault. It was mine. You shouldn’t be p-punishing him.” 

“Well I can’t punish you, can I?” Violet said, a little more sharply than she had intended to come across. She hadn’t meant to snap at him, but she couldn’t deny the truth in her words either. How could she hold off blaming and punishing Victor? She couldn’t bring herself to feel anything but love for Sherlock whilst she was so thankful that he’d survived what could have claimed him completely. Sherlock stared at her, breathing steadily. “I don’t want him here; he had every chance to help, to...get you some help and he didn’t. You think I can forgive that? I can’t, Sherlock. Maybe when we’re further down the line I can give you a share of that blame but right now, every time you open your mouth I’m reminded of how thankful I am that I can even have a conversation with you. No mother wants to be there the day her son has a stroke. No mother wants to be there when she’s told to be prepared…” Violet stopped talking and clasped her right hand to her mouth. “I’m mad with you Sherlock - but I love you too much for my anger to reach. And right now, all I want is to get you back completely and I’m focusing on that. And later, much later, I’ll show you how angry I was this day.” 

Sherlock blinked at her, breathing deeply, saddened at her words. He knew he could apologise again but he also knew it wouldn’t change anything. She would do what she always did - exert her Britishness; keep calm and carry on, and it would lack the warmth he wanted it to possess. 

“Come on,” Violet cut the conversation from going any further with a sudden change in her tone. “We’ll go for a walk, get you some fresh air for that chest…” She held out her hands to him. “Up you get, young man…”


End file.
